in the First Chapter of Genesis. 163 



Such being the present state of the case, it surely becomes a 

 duty to require a very high degree of evidence before we again 



the earth through successivegenerations of livingcreatures, 'Thou sendestforth 

 thy spirit, they recreated; and thou renewest the face of the earth.' The ques- 

 tion is popularly treated by Beausobre, Hist, de Manichesime, torn. ii. lib. 5, 

 c. 4 ; or in a belter spirit, by Petavius, Dogm. Theol. torn. iii. ; de Opificio 

 sex Dierum, lib. i. c. i. § 8. 



" After having continually re-read and studied this account, I can come to 

 no other result than that the words ' created' and ' made' are synonymous 

 (although the former is to us the stronger of the two), and that, because they 

 are so constantly interchanged ; as. Gen. i. ver. 21, ' God creaferf great whales ;' 

 ver. 25, ' God made the beast of the earth ;' ver. 26, ' Let us make man ; ver. 

 27, ' So God created man.' At tiie same time it is very probable that bara, 

 ' created,' as being the stronger word, was selected to describe the first produc- 

 tion of the heaven and the earth. 



" The point, however, upon which tlie interpretation of the first chapter of 

 Genesis appears to me reaUy to turn, is, whether the two first verses are 

 merely a summary statement of what is related in detail in the rest of the 

 chapter, and a sort of introduction to it, or whether they contain an account 

 of an act of creation. And this last seems to me to be their true interpretation, 

 first, because there is no other account of the creation of the earth ; secondly, 

 the second verse describes the condition of the earth when so created, and thus 

 prepares for the account of the work of the six days ; but if they speak of any 

 creation, it appears to me that this creation ' in the beginning ' was previous 

 to the six days, because, as you will observe, the creation of each day is pre- 

 ceded by the declaration that God said, or willed, that such things should be 

 (' and G od said'), and therefore the very form of the narrative seems to imply that 

 the creation of the first day began when these words are first used, i. e. with 

 the creation of light in verse 3. The time, then, of the creation in verse 1 . 

 appears to me not to be defined : we are told only what alone we are con- 

 cerned with, that all things were made by God. Nor is this any new opinion. 

 Many of the fathers (they are quoted by Petavius, 1. cc. II. § i-viii.) suppo- 

 sed the two first verses of Genesis to contain an account of a distinct and 

 prior act of creation ; some, as Augustine, Theodoret, and others, that 

 of the creation of matter; others that of the elements ; others again (and 

 they the most numerous) imagine that, not these visible heavens, but what 

 they think to be called elsewhere ' the highest heavens,' the ' heaven of hea- 

 vens,' are here spoken of, our visible heavens being related to have been crea- 

 ted on the second day. Petavius himself regards the light as the only act of 

 creation of the first day (c. vii. de opere primae diei, i. e. luce), considering 

 the two first verses as a summary of the account of creation which was about 

 to follow, and a general declaration that all things were made by God. 



'• Episcopius, again, and others, thought the creation and the fall of the bad 

 angels took place in the interval here spoken of: and, misplaced as such specu- 

 lations arc, still they seeta to shew that it is natural to suppose that a consi- 



l2 



